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Introduction to Telomeres and Telomerase

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Telomeres and Telomerase

Part of the book series: Methods in Molecular Biology™ ((MIMB,volume 191))

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Abstract

Telomeres are specialized nucleoproteins that have an important role in chromosome structure and function (1). The telomeric DNA together with it’s associated proteins protects the chromosome ends from degredation or aberrant recombination (1,2). In most eukaryotes telomeric DNA consists of tracts of simple, tandemly repeated sequences running 5′ to 3′ toward the distal ends of the chromosome. In humans the sequence TAGGG is repeated hundreds of thousands of times (3–7) but there can be large variations in the number of telomeric repeats between organisms; i.e., in ciliates there can be fewer than 50 nucleotides of repeated DNA, whereas some mouse strains have more than 100 kilobase (kb) repeats (1,8). Mammals show tissue-to-tissue variation in average telomere length (6,7,9–11 and within a single mammalian cell, length of telomeres varies between different chromosomes (12,13)

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  1. Cancer Research Unit, University of Bradford, Bradford, West Yorkshire, UK

    Michael C. Bibby

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  1. Cancer Research Unit, University of Bradford Bradford, West Yorkshire, UK

    John A. Double  & Michael J. Thompson  & 

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© 2002 Humana Press Inc., Totowa, NJ

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Bibby, M.C. (2002). Introduction to Telomeres and Telomerase. In: Double, J.A., Thompson, M.J. (eds) Telomeres and Telomerase. Methods in Molecular Biology™, vol 191. Humana Press. https://doi.org/10.1385/1-59259-189-2:01

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1385/1-59259-189-2:01

  • Publisher Name: Humana Press

  • Print ISBN: 978-0-89603-657-4

  • Online ISBN: 978-1-59259-189-3

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